


People Like Us

by End0fSummer



Category: Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Genre: Angst, Bookworm Dovahkiin, Bookworm Vilkas, Class Issues, Companions Questline (Elder Scrolls), Fluff and Smut, Missing in Action, Multi, Mutual Pining, Romance, Rough Sex, Sex, Slice of Life, Werewolf Angst
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-11
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-17 18:15:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 13,872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29354811
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/End0fSummer/pseuds/End0fSummer
Summary: When Vilkas is assigned to train the Dragonborn, he fears the worst—a spoiled-rotten noble girl who’s never picked up a sword, who expects everything to come easy and everyone to fall at her feet.After he meets her, he figures his prediction’s pretty spot on.Mari Gale-Borne’s lived a sheltered life, studying history and logic and lore in the College of Winterhold’s Arcaneum. She wants to study lives, not take them. And she has no interest in being a hero.Vilkas believes Mari’s the only chance Skyrim’s got.Mari believes there’s no problem that can’t be solved by reading a book.Of course, they’re both wrong.
Relationships: Dovahkiin | Dragonborn/Vilkas, Farkas/Avulstein Gray-Mane, Female Dovahkiin | Dragonborn/Vilkas
Comments: 34
Kudos: 37





	1. Castles in the Air

It was supposed to be easy, finding someone to warm his bed.

He was a warrior, wasn’t he? Celebrated for his skill and his brawn, his bravery. Lovers should have fallen at his feet in droves. Farkas watched the midnight changing of the guard at Dragonsreach, and fought off a yawn. He was getting sleepy, standing there in the dark. But the side entrance to Jorrvaskr was dark and secret enough for a late-night meetup. And most importantly, right next to his own bedroom.

He’d be able to sneak whoever the brothel sent over inside and into his bed with no one else the wiser.

_You mean, with Avulstein none the wiser._

Farkas frowned and shoved that irritating conscience of his back into the dark hole in his brain where it belonged. Avulstein had nothing to do with it. And anyway, Farkas wasn’t the one who’d stopped coming to the Bannered Mare of an evening, who’d stopped their late-night, mead-soaked conversations. And their even later-night wanderings back to Jorrvaskr, back to that most useful side entrance.

Farkas remembered the first morning he’d awakened with Avulstein in his bed, that Gray-Mane silver hair spread out over his pillow, his hand curved possessively over Farkas’s cock.

A door slammed in the temple courtyard below. Farkas shook the memory from his mind. He’d not seen Avulstein in weeks, and no one at House Gray-Mane would let him in, or give him any word. Avulstein was just…gone. Either that, or he’d tired of Farkas’s attentions.

And that meant weeks of lonely nights, weeks of pent-up energy.

Sure, there were plenty of men in Whiterun, but no one else held the same appeal, at least not for anything more than a quick fuck. He didn’t want to drink mead all night with anyone else. Or pretend to want to. At least with a whore, he’d get what he paid for, nothing more.

Footsteps shuffled in the darkness, and the pale light of a torch bobbed around the corner. About time. He grabbed the cold iron handle and pushed. A tiny sliver of light shone around the door.

Farkas got a glimpse of icy blue eyes and dark hair, curling wildly around a freckled face. And breasts that swelled over the top of a low-cut gown. “Fuck,” he said, and pulled the door closed. That’s what he got for taking the easy way out. “I, ah…think there’s been a mistake.”

The icy blue eyes widened. “Isn’t this Jorrvaskr? Sorry, I’m a little late. My guard’s horse—“

“No, you’re in the right place. You’re just not…look,” Farkas said, and shrugged, “I’m only interested in men. It’s not your fault, you went where they told you. They just sent the wrong person, that’s all.”

Farkas watched the woman’s expression morph from tired and sleepy to confused, all the way to roaring mad in two seconds. “Hey,” he said, backing up a step and bumping into the doorframe. “I don’t want a fight. Just—“

“Only men? Since when? Does Aela the Huntress know you’re standing out here, turning women away?” Her eyes flashed, and her cheeks turned red under the torchlight. “Have you ever actually read a book?”

“Shhh…” Farkas lifted his palms. He definitely didn’t want Aela to know he’d hired someone for sex. Everyone in Jorrvaskr would know, and he’d never hear the end of it. “Books don’t have anything to do with it. If you’d just—“

“Books have everything to do with it,” she said, her voice rising. She waved her torch as she spoke, the fire smoking and making whooshing noises in the cool, silent night. “If you’d bother to use one for something other than a nutcracker, you’d see—women warriors are nothing new. Makela Leki, the Hero of Kvatch, Queen Ayrenn herself.” Her nose wrinkled. “Though I cannot like the founding of the Aldmeri Dominion in any form, I think history might prove…“

Farkas frowned. He stopped listening when she mentioned the Aldmeri Dominion. The Thalmor presence was a dirty fact of life, and Farkas knew it wouldn’t be long until all of Skyrim would have to stand up and throw the bastards out. But until that day came, Farkas wasn’t interested in their history.

More important, he realized his mistake. “You’re here for training,” he said, cutting her off before she roused the whole city.

The woman seemed caught between exasperation at being interrupted and relief that he’d given in. “Of course I am,” she said, beaming a tight smile, and gave her torch one last emphatic wave. Bits of burned linen fell to the ground and smoldered black and red on the grass. Farkas stomped them out. “I thought you’d see the error of your ways, eventually. I believe…” she pulled a letter out of the pocket of her cloak and presented it to him. “I believe Kodlak Whitemane is expecting me.”

Another dim column of torchlight appeared at the end of the path. Farkas peered over the woman’s shoulder. Someone else walked around the side of Jorrvaskr, someone whose silhouette was decidedly more to his liking. He waved the letter away. “I’m sure everything’s fine. But you’ll need to go around back,” he said, and pointed to the path curving to his left. “Front door’s locked up late at night, and this door leads to the barracks. You’ll find someone out back—in the training yard—who can help you.”

She frowned up at him. “But—“

Farkas shook his head. “No, you’d better go on before they lock that door too,” he said, urgency creeping into his voice, and all but shooed her away. Her torchlight bobbed around the path toward the yard.

Vilkas would be there, he’d bet everything he owned on that. His brother’d been wasting his time, training late into the night for months now, ever since the first report of dragons in Skyrim reached Jorrvaskr.

“Fighting dragons isn’t our job,” Farkas had said, watching Vilkas shoot arrow after arrow into the bullseye at the far end of the yard. “You heard the jarl—there’s a Dragonborn, and—“

“The Dragonborn’s only one person,” Vilkas said, pulling a dagger from his weapons belt and flipping it toward a closer target. “I’ve heard she’s not a warrior, either, so she’ll need people like us to watch her back.”

Farkas had snorted—the very idea was daft. “People like us…you think you’ll get to fight with the Dragonborn then?” Vilkas threw another dagger into the bullseye. And another, his eyes like thunderclouds. A grin nearly split Farkas’s face in two. “You do!” Farkas let out a long, loud belly laugh that left him in tears. “Dibella’s tits, you do,” he wheezed, wiping his eyes. He couldn’t wait to tell Avulstein about this. “Well. Dream on, brother.” He clapped his hand on his brother’s shoulder, and took off around the path toward the Bannered Mare. “Dream on.”

Farkas gave a fleeting thought to what Vilkas would make of their new recruit. But the man Farkas had been waiting for finally sauntered up the path, his warm brown eyes meeting Farkas’s own with recognition, and more than a little appreciation. Farkas pushed open the door and quickly ushered the man inside, any thoughts of Vilkas, new recruits, or anything else at all drifting away like smoke.

* * *

Mari crept around the back pathway, keeping the walls of Jorrvaskr within arm’s length in case she lost her way again. Even with her torch, Whiterun was dark as pitch in the middle of the night, especially a cloudy night. She shrugged, peering around the mead hall’s awning—at least it wasn’t raining.

She tiptoed around one last bend, and there it was—the training yard that handsome, hulking oaf had told her about. It had to be—straw targets and training dummies littered the cobblestone and dirt expanse. Weapon racks ranged around the perimeter of a surprisingly spacious veranda. And there, past tables and chairs and scattered pieces of armor, loomed the double doors of Jorrvaskr.

Made of weathered, brandy-colored wood, each door stood easily eight feet tall, proudly emblazoned with pokerworked impressions of Wuuthrad, the magical axe of Ysgramor. Mari couldn’t wait to see Jorrvaskr in the daylight. According to her research, the Companions’ mead hall used to be an actual Atmoran ship commanded by Ysgramor. Legend had it, the ship’s crew had carried it across Skyrim—over their very heads—until they’d found the perfect spot for their first settlement.

And the Skyforge—Ysgramor himself had stopped in his tracks when he’d seen the giant hawk carved from a single stone, and declared the crew’s journey at an end. No one knew who’d carved it—according to the elves they’d captured on their journey south, it predated even elven habitation of Skyrim.

It was so intimidating. All of it.

Mari swallowed hard, her heart jumping in her throat. All she had to do was knock. She climbed the steps, her legs like heavy stone, and knocked on the door. The thumps echoed, loud in the quiet night.

But no one came to the door.

She frowned and knocked again, and waited in silence only half the time before trying again. And again. Finally, her knuckles hurt too much to continue, and she stepped off the stoop and onto the veranda. Disappointment and hunger gnawed at her stomach. It wasn’t a cold night, though, not compared to Winterhold. She could sleep on one of the tables and try again in the morning.

Mari frowned and slung her satchel on the nearest bench. She hoped the rest of her belongings would follow tomorrow morning, as the courier had promised. But the road from Ivarstead was long and snowy and dangerous, so she wouldn’t be surprised if they were delayed. She certainly had been—delayed. She’d not meant to arrive at Jorrvaskr after midnight, but her guard’s horse had thrown a shoe and the only stable they’d passed between Ivarstead and Whiterun hadn’t done such a stellar job.

She hoped the Whiterun stables employed a more capable farrier. Her own horse, Mitzi, had been with her for years. And her guard’s horse, Jacondo, was a dear. The sturdy little animals had carried them all the way from Winterhold to Ivarstead, and up and back down the craggy, winding road to High Hrothgar. They deserved a bit of a break.

So did Mari, but she wasn’t liable to get it. She sighed, suddenly exhausted, and spied a stoppered mead bottle across the table. She nudged it her way and shook it—about halfway full. Just the thing to help her sleep, and tide her over until breakfast. She pulled out the stopper and sniffed, and took a long drink.

The cobblestone yard started to glow under dim light that grew steadily brighter. Mari craned her neck to look around the porch roof. The clouds were parting around purple and green aurora and stars sparkling in the sky like handfuls of carelessly tossed diamonds. She pulled her feet up on the bench and sipped her mead, willing herself to relax.

Her eyes were just starting to grow heavy when the doors slammed open. Light spilled out onto the veranda, surrounding a man dressed in leather breeches and boots and nothing else. He carried a sword balanced over one bare shoulder, a longsword—dark and wicked looking with an edge that glinted in the starlight. The floorboards creaked under his steps as he stalked out onto the yard.

Mari lowered her feet to the floor and started to rise, announce her presence, but something about the man stopped her. She wasn’t sure what—perhaps something in the determined set of his jaw, or the effortless way he swung his sword in neat figure-eights, tossing it from hand to hand like an extension of his body.

He was a master, that much she was sure of. She’d read all the old masters’ treatises, studied their techniques—at least on paper. Perhaps this man had, as well.

She took another sip of mead and watched him run through a set of exercises, bending and stretching and spinning, all while swinging that sword without a break or a hitch. She wondered who he was, and what position he held at Jorrvaskr—was he the Kodlak Whitemane she was meant to meet?

If so, he wasn’t what she’d expected. The shaggy man who’d met her at the side entrance? An unmistakable Nord warrior, that one. He could stand in for any of her father’s guards—they were all big and gruff and slow on the uptake. But this man…well. He wasn’t unmistakably anything. His body was that of a dancer, quick and lean. There was a certain sharp wariness about his face, like that of a fox—sharp jaw, sharp cheekbones...

Mari realized she was openly ogling him, her gaze traveling from the low waistband of his breeches, sitting just at his trim hips, up the vee of his bare torso to his broad shoulders. His chest and back and arms were wiry and spare, but rippling with the muscles of a man who did this sort of thing…quite often.

Her cheeks warmed. Yes, he was handsome, very much so.

He finished his exercises and turned to face a training dummy—leather and straw and vaguely man-shaped. She carefully set her bottle of mead on the table without taking her eyes from him.

He bowed to the dummy, which she found poetically charming, and crouched low to the ground, his sword behind his back. And then he moved. Fast. Lightning fast, so fast she didn’t even see him rise, or see the sword cut through the air, but it must have. Because the dummy’s leather-covered head was on the ground, rolling around the man’s feet.

Her mouth hung open. She watched his back and shoulders rise and fall for a beat, maybe two, and then he lifted his sword toward the sky in an oddly familiar salute.

Mari could sit still no longer. She jumped up from the bench and ran down the stairs. “You read Shinji!”

The man spun around and advanced on her, holding his sword across his body, his expression measured and calm. Mari held her hands up, palms out, and took a step back. The rough wood of the lowest step creaked against the back of her heel. “Gaiden Shinji,” she said, her heart thrumming in her throat. “You read his works, didn’t you?”

She watched his eyes take her in—from her curly black hair to her green, fur-lined traveling gown to her slim black boots. His gaze paused where her sword might have rested, had she been a challenger. “Everyone studies Shinji,” he said, and again rested the blade of his sword against his shoulder. Mari found the movement utterly distracting—it did lovely things to the muscles of his arms and chest.

“Everyone might study his principles,” she said, forcing her gaze back to his face. His eyes were a strange, light shade of gray. Almost silver. “But not everyone reads him, no warrior I’ve ever met, at least. That move you did, and the salute. The way he described it...I recognized it immediately. It was phenomenal.”

He pursed his lips. “You obviously haven’t read enough of Shinji. Unarmed, sneaking up on a man with a drawn sword? Not so smart.”

“It’s been a long day. I’ll admit I’m not at my best.” Mari shrugged. “But I did read him, his entire works,” she said, and smiled at his skeptical smirk. “It’s a long way from Winterhold, lots of long nights by the campfire.”

A flurry of emotions played across his face in movements so small she might have missed it if she hadn’t been so focused on him to begin with. The muscles controlling his eyes and his jaw twitched ever so slightly, and a tiny puff of breath escaped his lips. His eyes widened, brightened with what looked like excitement. And then, his face shuttered completely, like a wall had come down between them.

“Fuck,” he said, under his breath. “What are you doing here?”

Mari blinked and her smile faded. That wasn’t what she’d been expecting. Not that she needed recognition, not like she expected everyone she met to fall at her feet. But for this man to treat her like she had nothing to offer was more than a little deflating. Perhaps he had more in common with the typical Nord warrior than she’d thought. “I was led to believe you were expecting me,” she said, and held out her hand. “Mari Gale-Borne.”

After several beats, he took her hand and quickly let it go. “No one expected you to show up after midnight. Why didn’t you go on to Dragonsreach? Daughter of a jarl would probably rate the best room in the house.”

“I thought it prudent to be ready to start tomorrow, as early as you do,” she said, passing over his quip about her parentage. No one cared who her father was, not anymore. “I read about the Companions too. You’re all up before dawn.”

“You’re quite the scholar.”

“Why make it sound like a dirty word?” She shrugged. “So are you.”

He stared down his nose at her—his perfect, thin-bridged blade of a nose. “I might read more than most, but I can fight.”

“Well.” She tossed her curls. He already knew who she was. No point in being coy. “I can Shout like a dragon.”

He halved the distance between them. “Not if someone kills you first.”

She pulled out the letter Kodlak Whitemane had sent her, inviting her to train at Jorrvaskr, and held it up in front of his face. “That’s your job, isn’t it? To make sure I’m trained up?” She lowered the letter with a tight smile. “I’ve done my part.”

He laughed and glanced down at his feet, shaking his head slowly. When he lifted his head, his gaze was cool, unreadable. “You think you’ve done your part by reading a few books?”

She very nearly didn’t see him move. Again. But somehow a dagger ended up in his hand. A fraction of a second later, it flew straight at her face. She yelped and her feet slipped out from under her. Something cracked behind her ear and her vision flashed red and silver. She blinked, and stared into the sky. One by one, all the stars winked out, and the night darkened to black.

* * *

“Fuck,” Vilkas said again, louder this time, and bent to scoop the woman—the Dragonborn, for Ysmir’s sake—into his arms. “Mari.” He whispered her name into the darkness as he strode quickly around the back of Jorrvaskr toward the temple courtyard.

The Dragonborn. Sweet fucking Talos. How long had he dreamed of meeting her? Of fighting by her side? Too long, especially if Farkas was telling the tale. As dreams went, it was mostly harmless—and hopeless. But then Kodlak showed him the letter. The Dragonborn—the daughter of Jarl Korir Gale-Borne—would be coming to Jorrvaskr to train. Vilkas and the rest of the Companions had been less than pleased to discover Skyrim’s prophesied hero was a noble girl—a scholar from the College of Winterhold, no less—a rich dilettante who’d probably never even lifted a sword.

She sure could duck a blow, though. Vilkas hated to admit it, but he was impressed. Most new recruits simply froze, staring wide-eyed at the dagger until Vilkas took pity on them and pulled it back. A salutary lesson Mari didn’t need. Although some spatial awareness coaching wouldn’t go amiss—she’d tripped on a cobblestone and smacked her head on the stairs on the way down. A nasty bump on the head, but nothing Danica couldn’t take care of. Helpful having the temple a mere quarter mile away.

Training Mari might be easier than he thought. Might have been, anyway, before he fucked it all up.

_What are you doing here?_

Of all the things he could have said. _Welcome to Jorrvaskr_ might have been well received. _Nice to meet you_ was old hat, but serviceable. Why not go with one of those? Excuses loomed like road signs in his brain, all he had to do was pick one—she’d set him off, skulking around, sneaking up on him like that. He’d not expected her to be so pretty, or to catch her too-observant winterblue eyes inspecting his chest. She’d made him aware of every drop of sweat on his body, cooling rapidly in the night air, every scar—white and rough and ridged—standing out like flags against his sun-browned skin.

_What are you doing here?_

He heard his own voice in his head again and winced, a sick, sinking feeling in his chest. He’d waited at Jorrvaskr all day. And night. Everyone else had spent the evening at the Bannered Mare, singing and drinking, but not Vilkas—he wanted to be the first to greet her. When she’d not shown up by midnight, he went to bed in a huff. But sleep wouldn’t come easy, not when his blasted brother had brought someone back to his room. The second time Farkas’s bed slammed against the wall separating his room from Vilkas’s, Vilkas gave up.

The Gildergreen came into view, glowing pink and gold under swarms of torchbugs buzzing in its branches. Mari stirred and sighed, brushing a fallen pink bloom from her face. She twisted her neck to look up at him and winced.

“Careful,” Vilkas said. “You had a bit of a spill.”

She narrowed her eyes. “You threw a dagger at me.”

“No, never,” he said, nodding to the acolyte at the temple’s entryway. “I never let it go.” The acolyte opened the door and ushered them into a shadowy vestibule.

“Where are we?”

“Temple of Kynareth,” he said, carrying her down an equally shadowy hallway lit only by moonlight streaming in through high, narrow windows. “Priestess—Danica—she’s a good healer.”

They crossed into the main chamber. Vilkas watched her eyes adjust to the temple’s bright light, watched her take it all in. Moonlight shone from oversized skylights high in the temple’s vaulted ceiling, illuminating a glass mosaic in the middle of the floor—a hawk in flight, soaring over a patchwork countryside. Moss and vines spilled from upper balconies, their yellow horn-shaped flowers drifting in an ice-scented breeze.

“Smells like it should be cold in here,” she mumbled, and frowned. “If you didn’t hit me with the dagger…”

“You ducked,” he said, his breath puffing out in a good-natured snort. “Honestly, I was impressed—excellent reflexes.” Her face brightened. “But when you ducked, you tripped and fell, hit your head on the stairs.”

“So,” she said, biting the corner of her lip, “if your reflexes were better, you could have caught me.”

Vilkas couldn’t help it—he laughed. “I didn’t expect you to duck.”

She was silent for a beat or two, and looked up at him, her ice-blue eyes nearly translucent in the moonlight. “Not a great audition for the Companions, hm?”

“Like you said, you can Shout like a dragon,” Vilkas said, and shrugged. “You don’t need an audition.”

Quick footsteps padded down the hall, growing louder. Danica entered the room and motioned toward a bed covered in soft, creamy linens. “You’re up late, Vilkas,” she said, watching him gingerly lower Mari to the bed. “Who have we here?”

“Mari Gale-Borne,” Vilkas said, waiting for recognition to dawn on Danica’s face. He didn’t have to wait long.

Her dark brows rose high, and she clucked her tongue. “This is a fine welcome to Whiterun, isn’t it?” She gently prodded Mari’s head to the side, clucking her tongue again at the purpling lump, the line of dark blood behind her ear.

Vilkas glanced down—her blood had dried in the crook of his elbow. His chest tightened. He’d insulted her. He’d gotten her hurt. Kodlak wouldn’t be pleased. “She fell on the stairs,” he said, his explanation inadequate to his own ears.

Danica rolled her eyes, equally unimpressed. “You can go on back,” she said. “I’ll have her all healed up by dawn.”

He nodded and turned to leave.

“Vilkas?”

Mari’s voice was soft and slurred, under the effects of the first wave of Danica’s healing magic. He stepped closer to the bed.

“You have to train me. You.”

Vilkas shook his head. He’d volunteered, of course, as soon as Kodlak told him she was coming. “I don’t think that’s such a good idea,” he said, echoing Kodlak’s words. “I’m a shit teacher.” Those words, he paraphrased.

She smiled weakly. “You’re the best swordsman I’ve ever seen.” Tears filled her eyes. Danica’s magic was working fast. “I need the best.”

Vilkas let himself look at her—really look—for the first time since they’d met. She was lovely. Those curls, of course, black as ebony and wild…untamed. She’d tossed them over her lovely shoulders when she’d smiled at him, her cheeks rosy pink above full lips. Her sumptuous clothes—lush and costly-looking—fit her curvy body like a second skin, exactly what he’d expect from the daughter of a jarl, even Korir.

He’d heard her story again and again—it changed a little each time, but he got the gist. She’d discovered her heritage after a dragon attacked Winterhold. Her father and brother had fought the beast, and brought it down alongside city guards. There’d been mages in the fight as well, though Korir discouraged that sort of talk. Mari’d run down from the College, shouting her brother’s name. As soon as she reached the dragon, her skirts barely brushing its leathery scales, the beast’s life force rushed toward her like a magnet, in a cloud of purple flames. 

_You’re the best swordsman I’ve ever seen._

Her flattery went to his head like the warmest brandy, and spun it around. He couldn’t deny it. But she was the daughter of a jarl. Her father had promised her in marriage to Ulfric Stormcloak himself. Something had happened to stop the union—some sort of break between the two jarls. Vilkas wasn’t privy to that sort of intelligence. People like him never were.

He wasn’t meant for greatness. But Mari was.

_I need the best._

And she was used to getting the best.

Vilkas clenched his fist and cracked his knuckles. He’d be damned if he’d end up as a feather in her cap. “Not my decision,” he said. “Kodlak’s already planned it out.”

She struggled to keep her eyes open. “We’ll see about that,” she mumbled, and her lids finally fell, heavy and still.

Danica held one hand just above Mari’s forehead. “Do you really think she’ll try it?”

Vilkas shrugged. “It won’t matter. It won’t work.”

“I wouldn’t bet against her,” she said, and laughed, low and soft.

A shiver went down his spine. A tiny part of him agreed. The rich and powerful always got their way. Vilkas gave Mari one last, long look, suddenly furious—at Mari, at himself. But he kept his expression neutral and pulled a pouch of gold from his trouser pocket. He rummaged inside it before shrugging again and handing the whole thing to Danica. “Someone will be by to collect her in the morning,” he said, and stalked off into the night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you got this far, you’ll notice I’m not as patient as my DB with the research and the lore. So some of it’s going to be wrong. I also have a 9-year-old who exaggerates little details of her life “to make it more interesting.” I might have picked up this habit re Skyrim lore as well.


	2. What We’re Up Against

Vilkas took the stairs up from the main floor two at a time, and walked quickly down the red-and-gold carpeted hallway leading to the Harbinger’s suite. He hoped whatever Kodlak had to talk to him about wouldn’t take long. It was already ten in the morning and he hadn’t seen Mari yet, wasn’t even sure if she’d made it back from the temple.

He’d delegated that particular task, after the second time he’d tried to sneak out and been waylaid by someone with a problem—a problem only he could solve. Funny how so many problems in Jorrvaskr came with that caveat, especially when he had so much on his plate already.

First, breakfast was late because there weren’t clean pots and pans to cook it in, and not enough hours in the day to clean them all in the first place. Not for one person, anyway. The solution was obvious—Tilma needed an assistant. Possibly two.

Menial slog in Jorrvaskr was the province of newbloods—Vilkas remembered doing his own fair share. But newbloods were scarce since the war broke out. Too many had quit, frustrated with the Companions’ neutral stance, and left to join the Legion or the Stormcloaks, whichever side they felt they owed allegiance.

Vilkas found a temporary fix—a trial assistantship—in Lucia, a girl of twelve who slept at the temple and spent her days wandering the city, begging coin and asking after her father. Lucia told him the whole sordid tale last week—her father’d left for Whiterun to stock up supplies, and never made it home. Her mother died of a fever not too much later, and her aunt and uncle took over the family farm and kicked Lucia out. Of course, Jarl Balgruuf was more interested in keeping the farm running—and collecting its taxes—than rousing himself to justice. He’d pointed Lucia toward Honorhall and considered the matter closed.

“But what about my father?” Lucia listened to Vilkas’s offer, her little face crumpled in anger. “I’ll never find him if I’m stuck in a kitchen washing pots.”

“You’d be running errands, too, out and about in the city as usual,” Vilkas said, and an idea popped into his head. “You know, we get all sorts at Jorrvaskr. People from all over want to hire us. Before long, the place’ll be hopping with people. More than Dragonsreach, even.”

“Why?”

He leaned in close. “The Dragonborn is training with us,” he said, and watched Lucia’s face brighten. He’d scurried the girl into the kitchens and introduced her to a grateful Tilma with seconds to spare before the next crisis hit.

And it was trickier—the basement larder was short on dried meats and cheeses and flour, and the neighboring farms wanted to renege on the deal they’d made with Kodlak a decade ago. Again, it came down to the war—transporting goods and supplies cost more than ever. That and conscription—soldiers needed their supply lines full—were driving up prices. He didn’t want to alienate his own supply line, but busting the budget wasn’t an option—Skjor stalked irregularities in Jorrvaskr’s incomings and outgoings like an eagle after a rabbit.

On and on it went, all morning long, until Kodlak had provided just the excuse he needed to get away. Vilkas rapped on the Harbinger’s double doors.

“Come on in.” Kodlak’s gruff voice sounded garbled and a little hollow, like he was talking around a mouthful of mead.

Vilkas pushed the doors open and stepped inside. A light hanging close to the low ceiling glared, bright as the noonday sun. He blinked. “What in Oblivion is that?”

“Good morning, Vilkas.”

He shaded his eyes. His gaze followed the soft, musical voice to Kodlak’s table in the corner where a breakfast of sweet rolls and mead waited on a tray—a tray set for two. Mari leaned back in one of Kodlak’s chairs, all those black curls spilling over her shoulders. Her eyes were red and a little puffy, but that wasn’t so unusual after spending the night in an unfamiliar bed. Otherwise, she looked to be settling in just fine—her purple velvet dress clung to the thigh she’d casually crossed over her knee, and her gold-embroidered slipper dangled from her toes. Relief she’d suffered no ill effects from her fall warred with irritation, though he couldn’t put his finger on what, exactly, had set him off. He motioned toward the ball of light. “So, you’re a mage, too?”

“No, nothing like that,” Mari said, her eyes downcast. “I picked up a thing or two at the College—Magelight, Detect Life. That’s about it. I might have been a dab hand at Alteration magic, if my father had let me study it.” Vilkas watched her smile flatten into a line, just for an instant, before it curved back into place.

“Mari noticed me squinting a bit.” Kodlak set his tankard on the table and tapped at a book lying closed on his lap. “I’m not so set in my ways I’d deny the improvement. Haven’t been able to see my own writing in years.”

“You’re welcome to it.” Mari beamed. “I’m not using my magicka for anything else while I’m here.”

Vilkas looked from Mari to Kodlak. The niggling sense of irritation flared. “So,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest and leaning against the doorframe, “glad to see you’re mended. And you made it here alright.”

She nodded. “Farkas—your brother,” she said with a graceful incline of her head, “came to get me. He was surprisingly helpful, all things considered.”

Vilkas shot Mari a dirty look and opened his mouth to ask what in Oblivion she meant by that, but Kodlak cleared his throat. Loudly. “Mari was just catching me up on her journey. And her visit to the temple,” he said pointedly, his craggy brows jumping halfway up his forehead. “I thought we’d agreed to put a stop to your habit of catching new recruits unawares?”

Vilkas shrugged. “She said she’d done her part in getting trained up simply by reading books. I thought to test that claim, nothing more.”

Mari gripped the arms of her chair and tossed her head to one side. “Reading the works of Gaiden Shinji isn’t simply reading books. The man was a master. And anyway, what’s wrong with reading?”

Kodlak chuckled. “Yes, Vilkas. Why don’t you tell us what’s wrong with reading?” Cheek laced his voice. 

Vilkas swore under his breath. He knew what the old man was poking at. A year or so ago, Vilkas tried to institute a curriculum—adding books and manuals—into Jorrvaskr’s training regimen. It wasn’t only Shinji who wrote about the nuances of fighting. A library of martial arts—a real library, complete with maps and models and catalogues of weaponry—would set Jorrvaskr apart from other guilds, even ones in Hammerfell. But of course, he’d come up against stumblingblocks at every turn—Farkas couldn’t read and didn’t care to, and neither did Torvar. Aela and Athis could read, but would never sit still long enough to see anything through. Njada—Vilkas was as surprised as anyone about this—had been enthusiastic enough, and Ria followed Njada’s lead, like she always did. But Skjor sounded the death knell by quietly pointing out that the budget wouldn’t allow it.

Vilkas aimed a withering look at Kodlak before turning his attention back to Mari. “Of course, nothing’s wrong with reading. Unless you’re learning to hold a sword like it’s part of your arm, or accurately loose an arrow on the run.” He ran a hand over a green glass bow at the edge of Kodlak’s weapons display. So many—iron and elven, even one daedric warhammer—all taken from foes he’d vanquished over the years. “How can you hope to understand war from reading a book? Understand the nature of people? Why they fight in the first place. It’s not just…“

Mari’s chair creaked as she leaned forward, her eyes alight with curiosity. Vilkas had a strange feeling she was studying him as intently as she’d studied her precious Shinji. “It’s not just…” he tried to remember his line of thought, but his mind went blank.

“It’s not just what?” She prompted, sitting on the edge of her seat, looking up at him like—

 _Sweet Talos._ “Nothing,” he said, and frowned at the disappointment on her face. He was letting her lead him too far from his point. “I’m sorry about your head. I never meant for you to get hurt. I just thought you should know, you can’t learn everything from reading a book.”

She pursed her lips. “Is that so?”

He nodded. “It’s so.”

She smiled sweetly and folded her hands in her lap, looking for all the world like a cat who’d just commandeered the most comfortable chair in the room. “Teach me, then.”

Vilkas’s gaze panned from Mari to Kodlak, who didn’t seem fazed at all. “She asked you already.”

“I wouldn’t call what she did asking,” Kodlak said, giving Mari a good-natured chiding look and a little salute with his tankard.

“I asked very nicely.”

“And then announced your own training plan, as though it were an established fact your way is the right way.”

“It is,” Mari said, and winked.

Vilkas listened to Mari and Kodlak’s cheerful banter—it sounded like tongs dragging over brass to him—and watched their smiles and winks. He’d been irritated since he opened Kodlak’s doors, but a vague irritation—like a word that wouldn’t come to mind or a mosquito buzzing around his face, never quite where he could smash it. But now, that irritation had a defined target. It surged, overflowing in a wave of anger, and resentment. Mari was a newblood, Dragonborn or not. But here she was, the jarl’s spoiled daughter, reclining in her chair and drinking mead with her slippers dangling from her toes like Kodlak’s study was her own salon. Telling the Harbinger of the Companions how to run his own guild.

“That’s enough,” Vilkas said, his voice raised just above simmering. He pushed off from the wall, ignoring Kodlak’s warning look, and Mari’s heavy-lidded scrutiny. “The Harbinger already has a plan, and he’s right. Athis is the best teacher for you, for blades—he’s quick and nimble, everything you’re going to want to be. And archery with Aela, for obvious reasons—“

Mari stood up fast, her chair thumping against the wall. “Obvious—is this because I’m a woman?”

“No, it’s because she’s the best,” Vilkas said, meeting her challenge and topping it. “If Ulfric Stormcloak himself wanted to learn the art of the bow, Aela’s who I’d recommend.”

Mari flinched almost imperceptibly when he mentioned the Stormcloak bastard. _Fuck_ , Vilkas cursed himself. He’d forgotten they’d been promised in marriage. He shrugged apologetically.

Mari crossed her arms over her chest. “And who taught these incomparable warriors their technique? I’m not saying they don’t have natural talent, but—“

Vilkas snorted. “Aela didn’t need training.”

Mari inclined her head again, and Vilkas fought to keep the corners of his mouth from twitching. Her most graceful motions and sweetest smiles seemed to come just before a cutting blow.

“Aela came to Winterhold a few years ago on contract—frost trolls were bothering horker hunters. My brother, Assur, went along, on one of their hunting parties. One evening, I watched Aela coach Assur. She talked about you,” Mari said, and smiled, her eyes half-closed, like she was thinking of home, of her family. A precious memory. Vilkas wondered if she missed it all—Winterhold, her family, the College.

He shifted his weight and frowned—Mari probably thought she could bat her sad eyes and force him to her bidding, like any other tool in her armory. Well, he wasn’t about to let a little sympathy soften his argument.

“I didn’t realize who you were, last night. At first. Then, when Danica said your name…” she took a deep breath and seemed to banish her dreamy expression with a wave of her hand. Her face was sharp and shrewd once more. “Anyway. Aela told Assur she learned the bow at an early age, but you’re the one who taught her how to breathe properly and hold her body to get lift and power. Assur talked of nothing for weeks but going to Jorrvaskr to learn to fight like Aela and Vilkas. So, as you see, you’re the best.”

And there it was, the crux of her position, of her very being, most like. He was a commodity to her, like a designer gown or a jeweled pendant. A trophy befitting her station. How could Kodlak not see it? Vilkas took a casual step forward. “And Mari Gale-Borne deserves the best, does she?”

Mari matched his step, storm clouds darkening her crystalline eyes. “You think I want this? You think I want to come here and take up your time, take up space that should go to an actual fighter?”

“If you don’t want to be here,” Vilkas said, venom curving his lips into a thin smile, “why don’t you go back home?”

“I’ve told you what I need. I can’t get that in Winterhold.” She spread her arms wide. “Tell me, Vilkas, where else should I go to learn how to keep myself alive next time a dragon attacks?”

Vilkas was growing tired of her haughtiness. Tired of her throwing her weight around. _Who does she think she is?_ “Master,” he said, pacing the width of the room, “you’re not truly considering this? Acceding to the wishes of this…” he flung an arm toward Mari, avoiding her gaze, “this outsider?”

Kodlak didn’t answer, just stared him down with a look, cold and furious, that left Vilkas in no doubt of how badly he was fucking this up.

_As a father, you may trust the Companions with your daughter, trust us to keep her safe and treat her well._

The passage came back to him unbidden, pulled from the letter Kodlak had written to Jarl Korir more than a month ago.

_As a jarl of Skyrim, you may trust the Companions with the future of our land, that we shall train the Dragonborn to be the best warrior she can be._

A cold splash of shame washed over his back and neck. He’d helped Kodlak write the words—it was his own steady hand on the page. But Kodlak had signed his name at the bottom, sworn himself to those promises.

And because of Vilkas, Kodlak stood in imminent danger of being forsworn. Long, silent seconds passed, and the last of Vilkas’s anger evaporated to nothing.

“Alduin…” Vilkas flinched at the sound of Mari’s voice, small, almost pleading, in the midst of the silence. “Alduin’s here, in Skyrim.”

He had to have heard wrong. Again, Kodlak was unfazed—this wasn’t news to him. Vilkas searched Mari’s wide eyes, her snow-white face. “Say that again.”

She clasped her hands and wrung them together, as if to warm them. “Alduin flew to High Hrothgar. The Greybeards, they very nearly bowed down before him. Mind you,” she said with a shaky laugh, “it was hard not to.”

Vilkas tried to imagine it—the great black dragon, Alduin, his red eyes bright with hatred, flying over the holy mountain as he’d done thousands of years ago. Alduin was the stuff of nightmares, the subject of every scary story Nord children heard around campfires, or were told as a warning— _behave, or Alduin will swoop down and eat you_. When dragons came back to Skyrim, stories of Alduin surfaced as well, but none of them seemed believable. Or at least, no one wanted to believe them. Vilkas swallowed hard. “Alduin is…here? In Skyrim? You’re sure? What did he—”

She closed her eyes and shuddered, as though fighting the memory. When she opened them again, they were glassy with tears. “I can’t talk about it. Not again, not right now. Just…please, Vilkas. _Please_.”

He stood stock-still and silent, watching Mari’s eyes overflow, tears spilling down her cheeks.

“Mari,” Kodlak said, gently, and passed her a handkerchief he’d pulled from a small box on the table, “go find Farkas. He’ll show you your room, get you outfitted. This one will find you in a bit to start your training.” He speared Vilkas with a hard look, daring him to say another word.

But Vilkas knew better than complain. Again. In any case, Kodlak had made up his mind. The old man dismissed Mari with a wave and the two of them watched her walk down the carpeted hallway toward the stairs, her head held high. Of course it would be—she’d gotten her way.

“Vilkas.” Kodlak’s voice cut through his grumbling. “Shut the door, and come sit down.”

Vilkas did as he was told. He watched Kodlak lean back in his chair and wince, only slightly. Danica had treated Kodlak yesterday as well, earlier in the day. His injury was a minor one—just the slip of a bandit’s dagger into his thigh during their last contract. Should have healed by now. “It’s a curious thing, Vilkas,” Kodlak said, laughing a little under his breath, though it didn’t light his eyes. “You call me Master, and you question my judgment, all in the same breath.” He pitched forward, resting his elbows on his thighs. His breath sounded choppy and shallow.

“Are you alright? That cut—“

“It’s fine,” he said, waving away Vilkas’s concern, “nothing to worry about. I’m old, is all.” Kodlak’s silvery eyes met his own. “Why are you fighting this? You volunteered for this very job, long before today.”

“And you said I was a bad teacher,” Vilkas shot back.

“No, I said you lacked patience. The fire that quickens your step tends to burn others. I stand by that.”

Vilkas frowned. “Then why are you giving in to her?”

“This woman—Mari.” Kodlak sat back up. His eyes seemed to plead with Vilkas’s. “She is…special.”

“I know.” Vilkas rolled his eyes. “She’s noble, she’s the Dragonborn. Of course, I know this.”

Kodlak’s brow furrowed. He glanced down at his lap and idly flipped the pages of his book. “Of course,” he said. “Yes.”

Vilkas waited for Kodlak to continue. After a long spate of silence, he tapped his fingers on the table. “Master…”

“There’s that impatience.” Kodlak huffed. “And I am nobody’s master,” he said, and his eyes grew sad. “You’re the mightiest warriors in Skyrim—you and Aela, Farkas and Skjor. Your _master_ would have set you on a path to Sovngarde, not away from it. I’ve failed you. All of you.”

Anger flickered and burned in Vilkas’s gut. He’d grown up in Jorrvaskr, grown up idolizing the warriors of the Circle. The elite, so powerful, so strong. One day, he’d pledged to himself, you’ll be like them. When that day came, he’d accepted the gift of his forebears, the gift that had strengthened hundreds of years of Jorrvaskr’s warriors.

But it was no gift. Last spring, Kodlak had called them together, told them what he’d discovered—they’d paid a high price for their speed and intuition, their power and strength.

Too high a price.

Their souls were no longer their own. Sovngarde—Shor’s Hall of Valor, the afterlife Nords fought and died to attain—was closed to them.

Skjor and Aela had taken it in stride, and Farkas didn’t think much about it at all. But for Kodlak and Vilkas, it was a sort of death in itself, one they relived every day. And would relive—every day, every month, every year—until they found a way to end the bargain. Cancel their debt.

If they lived that long. 

“You were deceived,” Vilkas said. _Godsdamned witches._

“I wasn’t deceived,” Kodlak said, shaking his head with regret. “What I was, was tempted. We all were.” He turned his sad gaze on Vilkas. “How long has it been since your last transformation?”

“Three months.” His wolf had whispered to him, the first time Vilkas had denied it the release it craved, the satisfaction. Whispered, cajoled, seduced him into breaking his word—to himself, to Kodlak. And he had, a few times, in moments of weakness. But after he’d found the strength to stand up to it, the seduction turned to begging. And within days, to threats, threats that hounded him during the day and kept him awake—fighting off nightmares—every night. For the past week, his wolf hadn’t spoken at all, just bided its time in Vilkas’s mind, sullen and silent.

“Three months,” Kodlak mused. Wariness turned his craggy face sharp. “What about Farkas?”

“Longer than me,” Vilkas shrugged. “Maybe five months.”

Kodlak huffed. “Worries bounce off that boy like rain on a tin roof, always have. Not to mention, he’s been able to find other outlets for his excess energy. Still no word from Avulstein?”

“They say he’s gone,” Vilkas said, waving a hand toward the door. “Farkas doesn’t believe it and I don’t blame him. Eorlund’s acting cagey too.”

Kodlak sat in silence for a heartbeat or two. “I didn’t give into Mari because she’s the Dragonborn, Vilkas. Or because she’s noble, or because she’d go over my head and complain to Balgruuf if I didn’t.”

Vilkas straightened, grateful Kodlak changed the subject. Between dragons and wolves, just now, he’d rather confront dragons. “Why, then?”

“I didn’t make my decision until I called you down. I watched the two of you circle each other like sabre cats fighting over a kill. Watched her stand up to you, which is impressive on its own.”

Vilkas snorted. “Us not liking each other doesn’t bode well for training.”

Kodlak threw his head back and laughed, a look of exasperated affection on his face. “Youth really is wasted on the young.”

“Fine,” Vilkas said, moving to stand. “If it means that much to you, I’ll train her. But—“

“Sit.” Kodlak held up a finger. “I’m not finished,” he said, and waited for Vilkas to obey.

“All joking aside, my boy…she admires you. And that means she’ll learn well from you.”

Vilkas’s chest tightened, but he kept silent and listened.

“It’s not a power thing, or a nobility thing. She doesn’t see you as a prize to be won,” Kodlak said, gesturing to his weapons rack. “She needs you. Desperately.”

Vilkas leaned back and stared at a particularly shiny elven axe, just to give his eyes somewhere to focus.

“And you admire her as well,” Kodlak said in a tone that brooked no disagreement. “You can’t hide it, not from me.”

Vilkas let out a low whistle. It did no harm to admit what was right before everyone’s eyes. “She’s pretty, I’ll give you that.”

“Pretty?” Kodlak looked at Vilkas askance, as though Vilkas had told him the sky wasn’t blue, or questioned the superiority of Honningbrew mead over Black-Briar. “She’s the Dragonborn, son. She’s a creature of legend. More power in her little finger, and all that rot.” He sighed. “I’ve seen the books lining your shelves. I know what dreams you dream.”

The old man was getting mystical in his dotage. Vilkas opened his mouth, but Kodlak clucked his tongue, forestalling Vilkas’s argument. “I made my decision because I was wrong. Eh, let’s say…uninformed. Now that I’ve met her, I believe Mari’s own fiery nature is more than a match for yours.”

Kodlak leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. Vilkas lifted an eyebrow. Kodlak did seem more tired than usual, of late. Slower. More careworn. Maybe he was just growing old, like he said. Maybe it was the stress of the times—civil war, Alduin’s return…

A question occurred to him. He cleared his throat. “Do you know what happened with Ulfric?”

Kodlak laid a hand over his eyes. “Gossip, Vilkas? I think you know better than ask me to divulge someone else’s secret. Maybe if you teach her well, she’ll trust you enough to let you in.”

Fair enough. He pursed his lips, chewing at one corner. “Gods. She’s been to High Hrothgar. She understands the dragon tongue. She spoke with…” Vilkas shuddered, and peeked into the tankard of mead Mari left behind. Half full. He took a long drink and shuddered again. “Do you think she really talked to Alduin?”

Kodlak groaned and half-opened his eyes. “See? Even if I let Athis and Aela train the girl, do you think you’d be able to stay away from her after this?” He shook his head and closed his eyes again. “I told you—I know what dreams you dream.”


	3. A Rainy Loredas Night

White fog hovered like frozen breath along Whiterun’s thoroughfares and alleys. It bubbled from the well in the middle of the marketplace and swirled behind the last scattered shoppers gathering carrots and venison and bread for their evening meal.

Vilkas packed the last of his own shopping into a linen string bag and fought the urge to whistle as he climbed the stairs, up from the marketplace and above the fog, toward Jorrvaskr. Misty rain had begun to settle in. Vilkas found it unaccountably cheerful, blowing soft and cool over his face. It made a nice change, he supposed, from the week’s glaring mid-Heartfire sun and eye-watering blue skies—Summer’s last hurrah before Autumn set in for good, with its chill and frost.

But the sun had put Whiterun’s farmers in excellent moods; Vilkas met with them earlier that morning and emerged from the fray with newly-negotiated deals, which put him in a good mood as well. Even better, he’d finished his errands in time to enjoy a peaceful Loredas night, all on his own.

Kodlak, of course, would be in residence, but he’d been more tired than usual the past few days, the sort of bone-tiredness that kept him close to his bed. It had Vilkas worried. Kodlak wasn’t one for socializing even on a good day, but he’d not left his quarters once in the week since Mari’d come to Jorrvaskr. And that had everyone else a little worried as well.

Not worried enough to spoil their Loredas night, of course.

Skjor and Aela were gone, out on contract in the Reach with a dozen blooded Companions. A tribe of Reachmen had raided Rorikstead last month and retreated into their warrens in the hills, taking supplies and livestock and the town’s peace of mind with them. The Companions were meeting up with a band of farmers and miners who’d had their fill of the thieving and vandalism and the rare but heartbreaking kidnap, and vowed to fight alongside Aela and Skjor to rid their homes of the Forsworn for good.

Ria and Njada were gone as well. They’d set out for Dragon’s Bridge that morning on compassionate leave—Njada’s father had succumbed after years of a wasting sickness, and wasn’t expected to last the week.

But everyone else was free to enjoy the evening at their leisure—over mead and music at the Bannered Mare, as usual, or at Honningbrew Meadery just outside the city walls, where Jarl Balgruuf was hosting a party. Not that the great man himself would show his face, no. It was yet another empty palliative to keep his thanes happy.

At least, as happy as they could be in their own miserable company—the jarl had invited Farkas and Athis and Torvar to serve as a buffer between the Gray-Manes and Battle-Borns, and help keep the peace. The two families had had a friendly rivalry going for generations until the civil war broke out, and they found themselves posturing like preening eagles on opposing sides. Lately, their posturing had come to blows—the last time Vilkas saw Avulstein before he’d left town and left Farkas heartbroken, he and Idolaf Battle-Born were beating the everloving shit out of each other under the Gildergreen, of all places. Took five guards to break up that fight.

But Vilkas wasn’t going to let politics ruin his own Loredas night. Even Tilma and Lucia had the day off, which meant he’d have the kitchens to himself, the baths, the training yard. Even in the rain, it was a rare treat. He’d just rounded the last bend around the back of Jorrvaskr toward the training yard when he heard a sound that stopped him in his tracks—a thwack and a clatter, the unmistakable sound of a dagger hitting a target and falling to the cobblestones.

_Fuck_.

He continued toward the yard on silent feet—he’d get a look at who’d intruded on his plans, and decide if he wanted to sneak back to the barracks entrance instead. The dummies came into view, and the first line of targets, and just around the corner of the veranda…

A cloud of curly, black hair.

_Fuck_.

Mari.

What Mari was doing in the yard, Vilkas had no idea. After their training session earlier that afternoon, she’d told him she was going to Balgruuf’s party. She should be there by now, in a velvet gown, drinking fancy wine, all that hair tamed under a jeweled tiara or some such frippery. Not throwing knives in worn leather leggings and a rain-sodden linen tunic.

He watched her pull another knife from the belt on her thigh and pinch the grip between her fingers. After a few deep breaths, she let it go. It wobbled toward the target and knocked against it, clattering to the stones below.

She stood with her hands on her hips. “Dammit!” She hissed, crouching low to the ground, lacing her fingers through her hair. It was a gesture of frustration Vilkas knew well. He’d seen it all too often over the past week.

Training Mari Gale-Borne was a challenge, to say the least. She was an attentive student, and she wasn’t afraid of hard work. After her sneakiness in approaching Kodlak last week, he’d had his doubts, figuring she’d be one to cut corners, try to find the easy way out. But Mari put more hours in the yard than any other newblood in his memory. He’d seen the spark in her eyes, and if she was telling the truth about her motivation…

_Alduin. Alduin’s here, in Skyrim._

No, the challenge didn’t come from any unwillingness to learn or from her work ethic which, for a noble, was well developed. The challenge came from the blue-million questions she asked, day in and day out. She questioned his methods, questioned his technique. Compared his stance to that of her hero Shinji or some other master she’d happened to read.

“I don’t know, Vilkas,” she’d said, glancing skyward as she rattled off some quote or other, “seems like the angle’s a bit off. And shouldn’t I be throwing from the grip, rather than the blade?”

He’d been patient at first, explaining the anatomy of newer throwing knives. They were sleeker, the blade thinner and sharper. “Grip’s heavier than the blade, so you hold the blade, and throw the weight.” But she’d kept up the fight, pointing at diagrams in an old manual she’d brought from Winterhold until Vilkas had thrown up his arms in his own gesture of frustration. “That book is a thousand years old, Mari. Weaponry’s made a few advancements since then, wouldn’t you think?”

She rose from her crouch and threw another knife, still stubbornly grasping it by the grip. And still it flew unbalanced and teetering through the air and hit the ground again, this time not even bothering to bounce off the target first.

Mari shrieked and stalked across the yard. Vilkas swallowed a laugh and backed up a step, hiding behind a scrubby tree. It wasn’t often he got the chance to watch his charges when they didn’t know they were being observed. And Mari’s technique was a little different when she wasn’t performing for him. She held her body less awkwardly, a little looser. Her elbow didn’t bow to the side as it usually did, despite Vilkas’s reminders to keep it straight. Her knees bent naturally and she used her body’s weight, rather than keeping her spine stiff and her feet planted.

If she’d ever listen to him about the grip, she’d hit that target, no question. The realization hit Vilkas with more than a little pride.

Unfortunately, combat techniques weren’t the only things Mari’d read up on. She’d mentioned her research into the Companions’s training schedules that first night, but it wasn’t until Njada’d interrupted his own studies a couple of days later that he discovered exactly how extensive Mari’s research had been. 

“Mari Gale-Borne is bothering me about cleaning privies, Vilkas,” Njada’d said, her voice dangerously silky. “Mind telling me why that is?”

“Mari’s on her break, ask her later,” Vilkas had replied automatically, without looking up from his book. But Njada’d stood by his bed, obscuring his light. After a moment or two her words sank in. He frowned and laid his book open on his chest. “Privies? What are you talking about?”

“Don’t you know? Newbloods clean privies, and scrub the barracks.” Njada’s bright smile didn’t reach her eyes. “Which means all our boots are wet because the jarl’s daughter thinks cleaning means splashing buckets of water all over the floor. She asked me to teach her how to clean a privy, Vilkas. I’m not going to do it. My own newblood days are far beyond me. I’m not going back. I’m not.” She narrowed her eyes. “Who told her she’s an actual newblood, anyway?”

Vilkas groaned. “Njada, I—“

“And that’s not all.” Njada yanked a chair out from under Vilkas’s desk and pulled it by the bed and sat, her elbows propped on her knees. “I caught her inspecting her own bed last night. Checking the bottom of it before getting in. This morning, she went through her wardrobe, all her drawers. She pouted a little and said ‘everything’s here,’ and looked at me like I’d just killed her dog. Ria asked her about it later. Get this, she read up on Companions’ hazing rituals.”

Vilkas covered his face with his book.

“Tell me, Vilkas, please. Tell me you don’t expect us to treat Mari Gale-Borne like an actual newblood. I’m sorry, I’m not touching her things. You know the whims of bloody nobles as well as I do. Let’s say I spike her night cream with nirnroot, like Aela did Ria that one time—remember that? Her face glowed for days.”

Vilkas laughed beneath his book. It had been very funny.

“But if I catch Mari in a bad mood, she might haul me in front of Commander Caius.”

“Well, if it’s any consolation, he’s pretty incompetent.” Vilkas lowered his book. Njada’s bright smile had crumpled into a scowl. “Alright. No one needs to teach her how to clean a privy, and I’ll talk to her about cleaning the barracks. But,” he said and sat up, and swung his legs over the bed, “couldn’t you play one little prank? Something small and not destructive? She’ll get used to her place here. It’s only been two days.”

Njada’s scowl hadn’t faded one bit, but the next day Mari’d told him with a smile that someone had replaced her copy of _Killing Before You’re Killed_ with volume one of _The Lusty Argonian Maid_. Vilkas had considered the matter closed, but the next day Lucia had come to him with the same questions.

“Vilkas,” she said, biting into an apple and gazing absently around the training yard. Her gaze lit on a black warbow, and sharpened. “What sort of person has never cleaned a privy?”

Vilkas snorted. “Why do you ask that?”

“Mari asked me how to do it. She tried to carry water from the well and spilled it everywhere. Tilma was so mad she could barely speak.”

Vilkas nodded slowly and tried to stifle his groan. He’d have to placate Tilma, too. Perhaps he’d buy her a pretty pendant from Fralia’s stall. “Mari’s a noble. She’s the daughter of the Jarl of Winterhold. So she’s probably never cleaned a privy in her life. She has people to do it for her.”

Lucia looked up at him and wrinkled her nose. “You make it sound like it’s a bad thing. You have people to clean for you.”

“So I do.” Vilkas laughed. “But it wasn’t always that way. I grew up here in Jorrvaskr. Had to earn my keep, just like you.”

She’d given him an assessing look, as though she was filing away everything he said to use later. “Mari’s nice, for a noble,” she said, taking another bite of her apple. “She listened to me talk about my dad. And she asked why the jarl didn’t investigate. Or compensate me for the loss of the farm.” She wrinkled her nose again. “Does compensate mean pay?”

Vilkas nodded.

“Well? Why didn’t he? Pay me, I mean? Mari said the farm should belong to me. At least, kept for me until I’m old enough, not just given to my horrible aunt and uncle.”

Vilkas had shrugged. “Not all nobles are nice.”

Vilkas had mixed feelings about Mari’s niceness as it was. Going behind his back and pleading her case to Kodlak seemed like a low blow. As well, she’d made that crack about Farkas, about him being _surprisingly helpful, all things considered._

But she’d been kind to Lucia, and she wanted to pull her weight, no matter how terrible she was at basic tasks. Maybe she deserved the benefit of the doubt.

Vilkas stepped out from behind the tree and opened his mouth to call Mari’s name, when she pulled another knife. But this time, she grasped it by the blade. And this time, when she threw, the knife flew straight and clean and sank deep into the target. The edge of the target, not the bullseye, but it was a start. He watched her jump up and down, her shriek of frustration gone, replaced by an equally shrill cheer.

The pride he’d felt earlier swelled. He took a step toward the veranda, scraping his boots loudly on the cobblestones to let her know she was no longer alone. She whirled around, her eyes widening in surprise. And she smiled. Not the smirk she’d used in Kodlak’s quarters, when she’d gotten the best of him several times over the course of their argument. But a real smile that lit her blue eyes.

Vilkas’s chest tightened, but he only nodded in response. Yes, he’d give her the benefit of the doubt. He’d try to clear the air, extend the arm of peace. And see what she made of it.

The misty rain started to come down harder. He sprinted the rest of the distance, his boots landing on the top step of the veranda before the downpour began in earnest. Mari made it a second later. The rain in her hair and the salty sweat on her skin rolled off her like perfume. She stood so close he could almost feel the heat flushing her cheeks. And he could see just how sodden that linen tunic really was. Something stirred, low in his belly. He held his breath and turned away, dropping his shopping bag on a table.

“Go on inside and get cleaned up, dried off.” He grabbed a torch from one of the sconces and lit the biggest brazier in the center of the room. “And come on back out.”

* * *

Mari’s slippers tapped on the steps leading up from the barracks, and she fidgeted as she ran, twirling the silver ribbons streaming from the neckline of her blue velvet gown. Get cleaned up and dried off, Vilkas had ordered. So she’d bathed quickly and towel-dried her hair, fluffing it back up into the wild cloud it always became in humid weather.

Her first week of training had been rough. She thought she’d read enough to know what to expect, but she had not. Not only did they begin their days disgustingly early—rolling out of bed and into the kitchen long before the stars faded—but breakfast consisted of thick pasty porridge and slices of yellow cheese she couldn’t hope to choke down before her body was properly awake. She’d asked for tea and was nearly chased out of the kitchen by their shrew-eyed cook.

After they ate, they ran. Around the outside of the city walls, around and around, stopping to do mad exercises in between laps—lying on the ground and pushing their bodies up straight over their hands, rolling boulders over the hills, going down on one knee over and over again. That last Mari’d thought looked easy. She’d been wrong, of course.

Oh, not like she’d even been able to keep up. Her wobbly, staggering version of running quickly turned to walking, and she tried to do the other exercises when she could, which wasn’t often. She’d been afraid the Companions would make fun of her. But no one even looked her way, which might have been a little worse.

By the time the sun had crested the horizon that first day, her feet ached and her lungs ached and she was ready to go back to Winterhold. But then Vilkas had walked out onto the veranda, and Mari found her second wind. She’d expected more of his anger, after her stunt with Kodlak, and she got exactly what she’d expected, just…not how she’d expected it. Instead of yelling and insults, she got calm, clipped instruction. Instead of fury flashing from his silver eyes, she got cool indifference. Matter of fact, he’d barely looked at her at all.

She let the door snick quietly behind her and stepped cautiously onto the veranda, wrapping one of her fingers tightly with the silver ribbon. Had Vilkas walked up in time to see her knife hit the target? He’d not given any indication—not a single _I told you so_ after she’d been so stubborn all week.

She hadn’t expected Vilkas to ask her to come back outside, and wasn’t sure what to expect when she got there. But the sight of him rolling out dough over a brazier certainly wasn’t it. A rich, smoky scent—savory and herbal—drifted below the cool, humid air. Her curiosity overcame her wariness.

“What are you doing?”

Vilkas looked up and smiled. His eyes shone gold in the twin torches over the brazier. Mari’s mouth curved in an answering smile before she could stop herself. “Cooking dinner,” he said, and motioned to a laden tray the size of a small shield on a nearby table. “Could you bring that over?”

Mari hurried to pick it up. She smelled sliced garlic and chopped rosemary and lavender. Sliced apples ranged on a plate with a bunch of blackberries. A bowl of butter, and a wheel of white cheese with a row of thin slices cut from it surrounded two bowls of what looked like salt or sugar—perhaps both. She held it out next to Vilkas. “Thanks,” he said, and plucked the bowl of butter from the tray.

A rough square stone covered the circular brazier, its pitted surface charred black in places. Red embers glowed underneath, and tendrils of deliciously-scented smoke drifted between the stone and the sides of the brazier. “That smells good,” she said.

“There’s apple wood burning in there,” he said, cutting pats of butter and dropping them on the two rectangles of dough he’d rolled out on the stone. “And a little maple, and the stems from the rosemary. Smells especially good in the rain.”

The dough bubbled up in the middle and let out a delicious aroma, a bit like warm ale. Pattering raindrops filled the silence while Vilkas worked. Mari cleared her throat. “Do you…do you do this often?” She asked, and immediately felt warmth flush her chest and neck.

Vilkas shrugged. “Sometimes,” he said. “Especially when I have the place to myself.” He smiled up at her again. “I’m not really good at sharing.”

“Oh,” she said, and backed away. “I can go. I didn’t know—“

“No,” he said, holding out a palm. “It’s fine. It was just a joke. Not a good one, obviously.”

“But if you’d rather be alone, I can go.”

“I wouldn’t have asked you to come back out if I didn’t want you here,” he said, his eyes locking onto hers. He turned his palm over and beckoned with a crook of his fingers.

She stood there like a statue, still holding the tray at her waist. His grin faltered, and he ran a hand through his dark hair, gripping it into his fist at the crown of his head. Suddenly the veranda seemed very small. Even after a week full of his imperious commands and barely concealed contempt, he was still so handsome. Why he wanted her there at all was beyond her.

“Come here,” he said softly, and pulled one of the tables over, right next to the brazier. She took a couple of shuffling steps forward, and he took the tray from her hands and set it down. “So, I brushed the dough with butter. Go ahead and sprinkle some of the rosemary and lavender over that one.” He gestured toward the larger rectangle.

She did as he bid. He reached for the sliced garlic and arranged it over the herbs. The crust around the edges hissed as a little steam escaped. “How’d you learn to do this?”

He shrugged, and kept arranging garlic in circles from the middle out to the edges. “More rosemary, if you would,” he said. “I don’t know. I can’t remember who I saw make it first. Could have been Kodlak. I was little, though. Maybe nine or ten.”

She raised a brow and sprinkled more of the fragrant green herb over the buttery, garlicky crust. “So you grew up here?”

“A little more on the northeast quadrant,” he directed, dusting off his hands.

Mari snorted out a laugh, and sprinkled more rosemary where he’d indicated.

“You laugh, but you knew exactly where to put it, didn’t you? And yeah, I grew up here. Me and Farkas, since we were four, maybe five.”

Mari bit the inside of her lip. She wanted to ask why two children grew up in a mead hall, a warriors’ guild. Did their parents leave them there as tiny apprentices? Was that even done? Had their parents been warriors who’d died in the Great War? There wasn’t a tactful way to ask, and Vilkas didn’t volunteer the information.

“Next,” he said, grabbing a handful of blackberries, “spread the apple slices on the other crust. Just evenly spaced, no trick to it. I’ll put the berries on in between.”

They worked in surprisingly companionable silence for a minute or two, and soon the crust was covered with fruit.

“Sprinkle a little salt over both squares.”

Mari looked over the tray. The white crystals in both bowls looked the same. “Which is salt and which is sugar?”

Vilkas glanced between the bowls and frowned. “I put them in different colored bowls so I could tell them apart.”

Mari waited, but Vilkas didn’t elaborate. “Well?”

“Well.” He scratched at the back of his neck. “I forgot which bowl was which. Taste one and see, I guess.”

She dipped a finger into the blue bowl and touched it to her tongue. Sweetness burst in her mouth and she closed her eyes, savoring the purity of white sugar without that bite of molasses. She was just about to ask Vilkas how often they got white sugar at Jorrvaskr, when she opened her eyes to find him watching her, his silvery eyes dark, what looked like a tiny smile tugging at his mouth. She swallowed, and awkwardly shoved the bowl into his hands. “Sugar,” she said, and picked up the bowl of salt.

When she finished with the salt, she looked back up, but Vilkas wasn’t watching her anymore. He’d picked up the slices of cheese and was arranging them haphazardly over the garlic and herbs. “Last step,” he said, dipping his own fingers into the blue bowl, “sprinkle sugar over the apples and berries. And let everything come together. When the cheese is all melted and the apples are bubbling, it’s done.”

“How long does it usually take?”

“Somewhere between five and ten minutes, depending on how long I let the stone heat up first. This one was pretty hot. And the apples were pre-cooked, so once the cheese melts and the crust is brown, we’re golden.”

He stood with his hands on his hips and looked at her like he expected her to say something. Do something. But now that Mari was finished assisting Vilkas, she wasn’t sure what to do around him. Or what to say. Her hands and feet felt clumsy and she didn’t trust her mouth, either. Luckily, something far away from Vilkas caught her eye, something flying over the city wall.

She walked to the edge of the veranda and wrapped one arm around a post, peering out into the gray-purple dusk. An eagle, wheeling its way toward Snow Throat. Or _monahven_ , as Alduin had called it. Mari shivered, remembering his fury that a _joor_ —a mere mortal such as herself—had sullied his holy mountain. She was still more than a little shocked she’d escaped that mountain in one piece.

A gust of wind blew misty rain across her face and chest, and set the torches to guttering. Mari closed her eyes and breathed deep. The combination of scents was intoxicating. Winds blew off mountains to the south, icy and clean, but they didn’t overpower everything else as they would in Winterhold. They didn’t cover up the softer, humid air carrying sharp-smelling grass and wild onions from the yard or the stinging bite of creosote and tar from the roof.

And Mari’d been right about that, after all—Jorrvaskr had started as a ship. Whether it was the same ancient ship that carried Ysgramor from Atmora was up for debate, but Mari liked to think it was so.

All that history had a scent of its own, drifting like leather and oil and the dust from a thousand libraries, and settling comfortably around the garlic and apples and smoke from the fire.

Footsteps padded beside her, and the heady scent of ale joined the mix. “Here you go,” Vilkas said, pushing a bottle of the stuff into her hand. She took another deep breath before she drank.

“Thanks,” she said, and shivered again. She crossed her arms over her chest and rubbed at her biceps. She met Vilkas’s gaze and quickly looked away, but not before she saw his eyes flick to her hands and back up to her face, not before she noticed appreciation light his silver gaze.

“You’re a little overdressed for the veranda,” he said, and took a drink from his own bottle. “I thought you’d meant to go to the party?”

Mari shrugged. “I don’t have anything warm that’s not a gown, or fur-lined mountain climbing gear. I need to go shopping, I suppose.” The eagle wheeled back their way with its high-pitched, keening cry. “As for the party…well. When the time came, I didn’t feel like going. I was a little tired, so—“

“So you came out in the rain to practice your throwing?”

She glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. “You saw that, did you?”

His lips curved in a cocky smile. “I saw you finally follow my instruction. Finally hit that target.” He glanced over his shoulder at the brazier and headed back that way. Mari’s stomach growled.

“Yes, well,” she said, following Vilkas toward dinner, “I figured I’d give it a try. And yes, you were right.”

He took a long knife and deftly cut the rectangles into pieces, and slid them on two big plates. “Come on,” he said, and set the plates clattering down on a table. “I think my heart might stop, by the way. You admitted I’m right about something.”

“It had to happen sooner or later,” Mari said, around the mouth of her bottle. She sat across from Vilkas and picked up a slice of the cheesy bread and bit into the corner. The crust crunched between her teeth, the cheese and garlic salty and creamy. “This is one of the best things I’ve ever eaten,” she said, and grinned. “I suppose you were right twice in one day.”

“Did you doubt my cooking skills too?” he asked, looking dramatically wounded.

“I don’t have much experience with it. I’ve read, of course. The works of The Gourmet. But the staff at my father’s house wouldn’t have wanted to see me in the kitchens. Nor the staff at the College,” she said, and took another big bite.

Vilkas gave her a level look, one brow slightly arched. “That’s a thing you should probably remember here, too.”

Mari stopped chewing. “What?”

He took a big bite and dropped the rest of his slice on the plate. “I don’t want to tiptoe around this. You need to stop acting like you’re some ordinary newblood. You’re not. You don’t have time to clean and scrub and haul water, and no one has time to teach you to do it right.”

Mari felt a blush slide up her chest again. “Did someone talk to you?”

He nodded. “Njada had plenty to say. Lucia too. Look,” he said, meeting her eyes, “it’s good you want to pull your weight. Doing chores. It’s admirable. But you’re not a typical recruit and you’re never going to be. And it makes everyone uncomfortable to treat you like one.”

“Why didn’t anyone say anything to me?”

Vilkas shrugged. “You’re noble. You’re Dragonborn. No one wants to get on your bad side,” he said, and wagged a finger at her. “I know you have one.”

Mari looked down at her hands. They were covered in little nicks and cuts and the remnants of blisters. She’d even started building up a callus on the side of her thumb.

“Mari?” Vilkas’s eyes were crinkled with what looked like concern.

She bit the inside of her lip. “I’m sorry about that, actually.”

The crinkles around his eyes deepened. “About what?”

“You know. Going to Kodlak behind your back.” She grabbed a slice of the apple and berry pie. “I just didn’t know how else to—“

“To get your way?”

She nodded and smiled a rueful smile. “I really am sorry.” She took a bite and closed her eyes. A blackberry burst between her teeth, spilling sweetness over her tongue. “Gods,” she said, around the mouthful of sugary crust and syrupy fruit, “is there nothing you’re not good at?”

“Talking to people,” Vilkas said, counting on his fingers. “Managing money. I’ve been told I can’t make a drinkable cup of tea.”

Mari perked up. “I can help with that.”

“I’ll take you up on it one day,” he said. “And thank you. For the apology.” He let out a long, dramatic sigh. “I suppose you are sinking knives into targets instead of decorating the cobblestones with them, so maybe everything’s as it should be.”

“Except that everyone hates me,” she muttered, taking a big bite of apples and crust and chewing balefully.

“Hey, Lucia thinks you’re nice. She told me so herself,” he said, helping himself to a slice and sliding a few extra berries on top. He waggled it at her. “Just…be yourself. And don’t expect people to treat you like you’re something you’re not.”

She tilted her head to one side and watched him finish his slice and tear into a second. He seemed lighter, somehow. Happy. And inordinately pleased with himself. Suspicion narrowed her eyes. “Did you cook me dinner just so you could lecture me?”

“Maybe,” he grinned. “Hey, you were the one who requested I train you.” He shrugged and tossed the last berry into his mouth. “You get what you get.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I have Covid, and have lost my senses of taste and smell. It’s weird, weirder than it should be not to be able to smell anything. I cooked out on the grill last night and smoked up our entire yard, and smelled nothing. It’s so different from just being stuffy from a cold. Anyway, maybe that’s where all the food and scent passages came from in this chapter, me living vicariously through people who can still taste things. And thanks to Borichu for testing this out and making sure my balloon-head wasn’t making a mess out of the story.


End file.
